Columbus Marathon 2012

Executive Summary

On Sunday October 21st, I ran the 2012 Nationwide Children's Hospital Columbus Marathon with the result of 3:02:29, which placed me 165 out of 5470 marathon runners.

If you're not interested in the events loosely related to this marathon, scroll down straight to the point.

My finisher's certificate.

So far I do not have access to most photos. I'll upload them later.

 

Training

I was in quite a poor shape for this race. I actually did about 4.5 weeks directly pointing at the marathon -- exactly the time that I had in Pittsburgh minus the Great Race.

Before that, in Moscow, I was got down by the visa issue: I would run a couple of miles, stop, walk home, and eat a lot of candy. This doesn't usually work well with marathons.

I did only two of "long" runs in preparation to Columbus, one was 15 miles (then I ran of out fuel) and 18 miles (lots of walking and rest).

In one sentence, I didn't set very high expectations for this race.

 

On the Eve of the Marathon

Alina and I had a very nice Saturday in Columbus -- the capital of the Ohio (reads "Oh-ee-yo") state.

First we drove through the fascinating Fall scenery of Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Ohio for several hours.

Food stops is an appropriate decoration for any scenery.

Guess: some trucks crashed here.

We visited the Columbus Marathon Expo. One should never disregard the joy of shopping, right?

 Saw the Ohio Statehouse.

Saw other sorts of nicely-looking building with little idea about their functional purpose.

A brother of the Cathedral of Learning.

Fountains!

Yandex has an office in Columbus.

It is very symbolic that the office is on Gay street.

We also visited the famous Rose Garden, which has unfortunately mostly faded.

 

 

 

We also went to the Topiary Garden. For my commoner's view, it's just a bunch of human shapes made out of plants.

Err, not only human.

Oh yeah, and many ducks.

Then we just went to our hotel room and slept until 4:30am. Getting up so early was not the moment favored the most by Alina. She even refused to take a collective picture.

Marathon

The race started at 7:30am in Downtown Columbus.

The temperature was perfect: about 42F (~5C) in at the start and about 60F (~15C) at my finish.

No explanation given.

We arrived early enough to go around the area, which was flooded by people in the next 30 minutes.

At the local Times Square.

Ghostly Statehouse.

Some American flags are almost as big
as the whole America.

Crowds gathered in the starting corrals at 7, so I couldn't even get to A, where I was assigned. I just sat on the ground, trying to not give my legs more stress than the race promised.

The orchestra is about to perform the anthem.

And finally, a bunch of military guys performed the national anthem.

Shortly, the race started. 

Let me finish with the photos at this point and continue some time later. To get a sense of the whole race, take a look at the recap video:

 

On My Results

Here's my official result record.

With respect to my age, I ran poorly: 393 age grade place overall (this means being rated based not just on the time, but on the combination of time and age). Here's the full list.

19 women have beaten me. Almost all of them are older than me. Ha-ha. Incidentally, I'm 19th in my division (males 20-24). Conclusion: if those women  decided that they needed a young bf who is slower than they are, I would be picked!

The run went through cool areas like Bexley, German Village, and the Ohio State University.
It was flat and fast.

My average pace before mile 20 was around 6:45-6:50 per mile (4:13-4:15 per kilometer). After that point, I started to walk, chill out, and flirt with spectators because my legs were not good for running anymore. If not for the downhill final miles, I probably wouldn't have been able to get to the end at all.

It's all good and well, but it's time to think about the next Spring. Boston marathon registration closed 10 days before I qualified for it in Columbus. Other options that are relatively close and well-known are the marathons of Cincinnati, Cleveland, and obviously Pittsburgh (all in May). So far I'm biased toward the Cleveland one.

Upd. Check out more photos from the marathon.